Newsgroups: comp.lang.apl
Path: watmath!watserv1!torn!cs.utexas.edu!usc!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!uunet.ca!geac!itcyyz!yrloc!hui
From: hui@yrloc.ipsa.reuter.COM (Roger Hui)
Subject: Re: Question On Verb Rank
Message-ID: <1992Jul25.054000.15095@yrloc.ipsa.reuter.COM>
Organization: Iverson Software Inc.
References: <1992Jul23.142521.12231@Trirex.COM>
Date: Sat, 25 Jul 92 05:40:00 GMT
Lines: 19

Tom Affinito writes regarding the monadic rank of + and other scalar fns.

Welcome back, Tom.  Assigning rank 0 or rank _ to the monad + (and - others 
of like ilk) makes no difference (produces the same result) when the verb
per se is applied to an argument, but unbounded rank makes for more
intuitive behaviour when the verb is composed with others.  For example,
 
   ss =. +/@*:     NB. sum of squares
 
The property stated in your msg, that "verb rank is supposed to represent
the natural shape of the verb's arguments, and that higher dimension data
will get automatically sliced by the verb into units of the verb's rank",
is a consideration, but not the only one, in deciding what rank to assign.
As always, if a rank different from the assigned rank is required, the rank
conjunction (") can be used.

------------------------------------
Roger Hui, Iverson Software Inc., 33 Major Street, Toronto, Ontario  M5S 2K9
Phone: (416) 925 6096;  Fax: (416) 488 7559
